Is Antony’s price going up or down for Manchester United? Reports are conflicting

It has been claimed that Ajax are putting up their price for Antony to ward off interest from Manchester United, in complete contrast to another report last night.

The Ajax winger is one of many former Erik ten Hag players to be the subject of exhausting rumours this summer with speculation surrounding Frenkie de Jong taking the biscuit.

Ten Hag has managed to get Tyrell Malacia, Christian Eriksen and Lisandro Martinez over the line so far this summer but many other rumours continue to rumble on.

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A reported asking price of £68m for Ajax winger Antony had seemingly put Manchester United off with speculation a lot quieter over the last couple of weeks.

However, last night Sam Pilger – who writes for Forbes, The Athletic and several other publications – claimed that the Red Devils are now set to make a fresh bid for Antony with Ajax ‘now willing to lower their initially unreasonable asking price and do a deal’.

Pilger even described the potential transfer as ‘edging closer’. Lovely, so we can accelerate this now and get another deal done and dusted, right?

Not if the latest rumours from the Daily Mail are to be believed with the newspaper insisting that Ajax have actually ‘dramatically increased’ their asking price for Antony.

Is his price going up or down? Well, the Daily Mail reckon Manchester United will now have pay £84m instead of £68m if they want to sign him this summer, an increase of £16m.

Apparently that price rise is to ‘underline he is not for sale’ with Ajax boss Alfred Schreuder keen to send a message that he is ‘non-transferable’ this summer.

But surely saying he’s not for sale would be a much better way to underline to Man Utd that he’s not for sale. Putting a price tag on him underlines he is for sale.

The Daily Mail adds that Antony is Ten Hag’s top target as he looks for a ‘skilful wideman’ with the Brazilian’s representatives ‘in Manchester for talks’ last week.

Speaking to ESPN last week, new Ajax boss Schreuder said: “Internally we have agreed that we want to keep the current squad together. Nobody wants to sell him… Antony is working well. I don’t have the feeling that he’s busy with a transfer.

“I really think he will stay… we have also bought players. But we have sold so many players that I assume nobody will leave. If we sell one more key player, it wouldn’t be good for us.”